24 ica. All the reminiscences of the United States that he politely introduced in- to our conversation dated from before 1919. He gave detailed accounts of several Chaplin comedies, like "The Count" and "The Cure," which he had seen then. We went down to supper with the pilot, and Captain Petersen, pointing to the whiskered portrait, said to me, "That is a man who once owned eighty sailing ships. Even when he was ninety-two he combed his beard for one hour every morning. I remember see- ing him in my home town when I was a boy. The company owns only a cou- ple of ships now. It belongs to an old lady, who lives in my town also." His town is a sleepy little CIty in south- ern Norway which in the nineteenth cen tury was a great port for sailing ships. The Regnbue, the Captain explained to me, is emphatically a ship from his town. Not only is she owned there-although, as he explained, owners captive in N or- way had no control over their ships for the duration of the war-but skipper, chief officer, and second officer all came from there and had known each other as schoolboys. Both the Captain and the chief officer, a man named Gjertsen, had even been married aboard the Regnbue. Their brides had joined them on the ship at Antwerp and Constanta, Rumania, respectively. Petersen had been second officer and Gjertsen third officer then, and they had honeymooned in turn in the captain's suite. The wives were at home now. "The second and third officers have wives in Norway, too," he said, "and so has the chief en- gineer. I was lucky enough to have a vacation in December, 1939, so I saw my wife and boy only a little while be- fore the Germans came." Petersen told me that when the Ger- mans invaded Norway the Norwegian government had commandeered Nor- wegian ships all over the world, order- ing those at sea to put into neutral or Allied ports. A radio message had been sufficient to accomplish this. Only a small part of the merchant marine had been caught at home. Now the exiled government's income from ship hire not only supported it but provided a surplus, which is to be used for the nation's reconstruction after the Germans are driven out. He didn't show any doubt that they would be driven out, nor did anyone I talked to on the Regnbue. The boatswain, a weathered gnome of a man, once said to me, "I couldn't sleep at night if I didn't believe on it." The owners of the ships were nearly all caught in the invasion. The government has promised that after the war they will receive compensation for the use of their ships provided they pay allotments to the sailors' families in the meanwhile. So the captive families have been receiving small amounts of money, but even with money there isn't much food. T HERE was a door at each side of the saloon. One led to the pantry and the steward's cabin, the other to the deck officers' quarters. The officers had their mess aft, in the other deck- house. After supper on a normal evening aboard the Regnbue, I was to learn, the Captain and the steward visited the deck officers. Then, at about eight o'clock, everybody visited the steward and drank coffee, made in a big electric percolator which the steward brought in from the pantry. I suppose a torpedo would have disrupted this routine, but nothing less could have. This evening marked my initiation into the ship's social life. Since we were still in port, it was a soirée de gala; none of the officers had to stand watch and it was all right to use the short-wave radio in Gjertsen's cabin. Such sets are sealed at sea because they cause a radiation which can betray a ship's position. For news of the outside world you depend on what the wireless operator picks up on long-wave. Around seven o'clock, the Captain, the pilot, the steward, and I marched into Gjertsen's cabin, where the other officers already were gathered. Gjert- sen, a tall, dark man who looked some- thing like Lincoln, was stretched out on his berth halfway between floor and ceil- ing. His wedding picture hung just above the berth. G j ertsen had not been t, r; ;. } j.!r :',:. !I) P' to. ..",....; ;t:: ..;.),.. - . :1>- ". ' "'> . : , { ,"-:. .,..... i;i:"f; " ... .; _. .' ;';".;1;,.:=' , h. . :o-. "'V p'.:3'i:C -:Ii i'i - .;owt:J <.. t ":. ..__ '. :t'; s,..... .. '!!I. I - -,,:. ':'.; '!!:'.:,;)'-'. i << ï. -. .,"" .. . . . - " .11. ,t( ...r...l\ . ' i ; tt . : t < -" -:-. . . . . t J' I t . , , , ,. ...' \I "!lit,.!!" t.' ..#,.,J\ J: è J....I . .f:." -;4-it ".';. . ...)', ''', -."::- J .:;. :'It.,l i::t':: c .:t"" ' :<g::'._' _. '. . . ;.. '::-j ,!,- 1" p: i ':. i:ø : :-. r . - Ii - ": 1:;- "'_. ,. \.()... home since 1937. Haraldsen, the sec- ond officer, who was small and jolly, turned the dials of the radio, with occa- sional professional counsel from Grung, the wireless operator, a serious young fellow whom the others considered something of a dandy. He came from Bergen, which is almost a big city. Bull, the third officer, the big fellow in the orange sweater, sat on the divan looking at a picture of the backsides of thirty- two bathing girls in Life. He didn't turn the page all evening. Nilsen, the gun- ner, sat on the floor and said nothing. He hardly ever said anything to any- body. The Captain explained to me later that it was because Nilsen was a whaler. Whalers talk themselves out on their first voyage, the Captain said. They ex- haust all possible topics of conversation, then fall silent for life. "It isn't like a lighthouse-keeper," Petersen said. "He hasn't had a chance to talk in months, so he is bursting with it. But a whaling man is talked out." Gjertsen hated the radio, but he insisted on keeping the set in his cabin because he liked company. No matter what kind of music Harald- sen got, Gjertsen said it was rotten and Haraldsen should turn to something else. Whenever they got a news pro- gram he just fell asleep. He said there was enough trouble on the ocean with- out dialling for it. They were all low that evening because of a broadcast by the Norwegian radio of the news that the Germans were planning to cut off the money for their families. "I wonder how long people in the old country will be able to keep from starving," Harald- sen said helplessly. "Why don't the Brit- ish start the invasion?" Grung demand- ed, looking sternly at the English pilot. "All the fellows who escape from Nor- way say there are only a few thousand Germans there." "Full moon tomorrow night," the pilot said pleasantly, by way of changing the subject. "Yes, fine moon for dive bombers," the radioman said resentfully . "We'll be right in the middle of E-boat Alley then." "Maybe there'll be fog," the pilot suggested helpfully. "Fog is no good for bombers." "Fog is fine for E-boats," Grung said. "Can't see them coming." Grung, I was to learn, liked to have something to complain about; actually, he worried little about enemy action. Danger at sea is like having a jumpy appendix: men can live with it for years, knowing in an academic way that it may cause trouble but forgetting about it most of the time.